Vomit costs you extra, Savannah St. Patrick's Day cabbies say

It's the busiest day of the year for Savannah bars. It's also the busiest day of the year for Savannah taxis.

Cab drivers do their best to navigate the St. Patrick's Day chaos - and try to keep themselves, their passengers and their upholstery safe in the process.

"I look forward to St. Patrick's Day with guarded anticipation," says Lyle Myers, a former chiropractor who's been driving taxis in Savannah for four years.

Myers says people swamp his cab and pound their fists against the windows, even when there are already passengers in the backseat. He quickly learned to keep the doors locked.

Daytime crowds are more manageable, though. For Robert Patterson, a Savannah native who's been driving cabs the past five years, March 17 follows a predictable schedule: the good, the bad and then the ugly.

"I pick up couples at the beginning of the night and they're so polite, wearing suits and ties, dresses and heels," he says. "I go get those same couples at the end of the night and hardly even recognize them. They argue the whole way home, with all their issues coming to bear in the back of my cab."

Patterson attributes much of the extreme behavior to people who don't normally drink but toss all inhibitions aside on St. Patrick's Day.

Myers has learned that the hard way. He now keeps a bucket handy.

"It's too expensive not to," he says, though cab companies do not foot the entire bill. Any customer who vomits in a cab has to pay a fee, which ranges from $75 to $150, depending on the company.

When he can, Patterson avoids the night shift altogether and instead heads out early the next morning.

"There are hardly any cabs out March 18. ... That's when I come out."

But even then, he can't totally dodge the debauchery.

"Last year, a man called at 6 a.m. asking to be picked up outside Wild Wing Cafe in City Market," Patterson says. "When I got there, his shirt was tattered and he had twigs in his hair. He said he'd just woken up in the bushes and that a security guard told him he had to go. Then he said he couldn't go home because, when he'd left the house, he'd told his wife that he was only going to the grocery store."

None of this fazes Joe Tate, who has been driving cabs in Savannah for 25 years. With five air fresheners hanging from his rearview mirror, he seems ready for anything.

"Lots of people who get in my cab on St. Patrick's Day don't know where they're going," Tate says. "People give me their licenses and I figure out their addresses and get them home. I don't mind. It's just one day a year."

Whether drivers love St. Patrick's Day or not, they are sure to be exhausted by the end of it.

Jess Erthal is a PediCab driver - but last year, after 10 hours of pedaling, she was ready to be a passenger.

"I got off work and my legs were like Jell-O," Erthal says.

She figured she would catch a ride home in a coworker's cab. She spotted four free drivers a block away and thought she was in luck. But on a day when everyone is Irish, luck is spread pretty thin. Within seconds the cabs were taken, and Erthal walked home.